You know what I hate? Bonus tracks. Now I realize many of you music snobs in the audience are anxiously awaiting the sainted day when your favorite Beta Band album is released with 27 new never-before-heard tracks, including a special live acoustic version of "Eclipse" sung entirely in Esparanto, with only the looped sounds of a dog lapping water from its bowl as percussion. Well, that's fine if that's how you want to play it, but me? I hate that crap. Especially when it is older bands that I am just starting to really get into. All you can find are remastered 15th anniversary 2-disc extravaganzas loaded with bonus tracks. Listen, if the shit wasn't good enough to make the album the first time around, then I don't want it.
Recent example:
I discovered the other day that my local library system has a surprisingly good collection of music, so I put in a few requests and went and picked up some CDs. One of these was the seminal 1992 debut album of Pavement, Slanted and Enchanted. When originally released, this album, which many consider one of the most influential indie-rock/lo-fi CDs of the 90s, featured 14 songs. Thats a lot, right? Or at least a good amount. Well, the version my library has is the 10th anniversary re-release titled Slanted and Enchanted: Luxe & Reduxe. It has 48 fucking tracks. 48! Two tightly packed discs of 24 tracks each! My intention (no surprise here) is to copy all these CDs that I check out to my iTunes and then make personal copies for listening to in the car. There is no way I am copying all of these tracks. Well, I may rip them, but I will not burn them (nerdspeak!). The copy I make will feature only the original 14 tracks. The way the album was orignally constructed and meant to be listened to.
Now don't get me wrong - I am sure these bonus tracks are of great value to a true Malkmus/Pavement junkie. I am not one of those. Maybe someday I will be glad I copied all those live tracks, as well as the "John Peel Sessions" recordings (whatever the eff that means), but for now, I'll stick to the first 14 songs.
A good album (which this one is purported to be) is crafted as an overall work of art. Yes, each song is in and of itself a single entity (your Pink Floyds and Mars Voltas notwithstanding), but the flow and sound, and even production patterns of the LP often contain a certain rhyme and reason. Now, if you slap a few extra songs onto the end that didn't make the cut the first time around, it messes up that flow. It also pisses me off. Those bonus tracks often sound different. They weren't mixed the same. And if those songs are just live or demo versions of songs already on the album, it makes me want to go out and kill a hooker (even more than usual). I already heard this song 30 minutes ago! It was track four! And it was better the first time around!
So please, keep your bonus tracks to yourself, bands. If you insist on releasing them, either release them as a separate album that I can ignore or entirely on a seperate, second disc that I can choose not to burn. Thank you.
2 comments:
maybe it's for nothing, but this is the third significant blog-related stephen malkmus reference i've seen in the last couple of days. one on my blog and the other on freedarko. maybe god is telling me to kill stephen malkmus. does anyone have a copy of catcher in the rye i can borrow?
well, obviously i saw both the freedarko post and yours which pined for the music of our junior high years, which is what led me to eventually checking my library website, leading me to get that pavement double cd, which led me to kill a hooker, and which led me to write this post, which will now lead you to kill stephen malkmus. and now malkmus and a prostitute will be dead, and it is all because of joe dumars, darko milicic, john linnell, john flansburgh and your boy dave matthews. i think i'm gonna go lay down now.
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